Ogun Community One-Year Blackout Lingers Over IKEDC, IBEDC Disagreement

by Mercy Ulasi
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A dispute between the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company and the Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company has resulted in a blackout in the Ogijo hamlet of Ogun State’s Sagamu Local Government Area for over a year.

While regretting the development, the Ologijo of Ogijo, Oba Kazeem Gbadamosi, together with landlords and inhabitants in the town, appealed to power companies to restore power in the settlement, which had been without power since February 2022.

ANAEDOONLINE Metro had reported that the situation had been making life difficult for people living in the community as they, alongside business owners, resorted to spending money on purchasing fuel to power their generating sets to power their homes and shops in the area.

Landlords, residents and business owners, who could no longer cope with the situation, were said to have abandoned their homes and shops and relocated to areas where they could access power.

Commenting further on the development, a business owner, Dare Idowu, while lamenting over the amount of money he had been spending daily on purchasing diesel to power his generator, appealed to the power distribution firm in charge of the community to restore power supply in the area.

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He said, “It is not easy at all. I spend at least N7, 000 on diesel per day. Because of this issue, many have abandoned their houses and moved to other communities.

“Even the sachets of water I produce, those that manage to buy from me often buy iced blocks to cool them as there is no electricity to power their refrigerators. Without that, people won’t buy from them. This is all happening despite each household contributing N5,000 each for electricity to be restored in the community.”
Another resident, Akin Bamidele, said the power distribution firm promised to resolve the problem in December 2022, adding that the blackout was persisting in the community.

“Landlords will do just about anything to get new tenants to occupy the houses abandoned by previous tenants and even the landlords. One tenant left just a few months after moving in. This was because electricity was not restored in the community in December as promised before he moved in,” he said.
Reacting to the development, Gbadamosi said the idea to raise money to restore power in the community was brought up by residents after officials of the IBEDC revealed that it lacked the materials needed to end the blackout in the community.

He said, “IBEDC did not ask us for any money. They only told us that their problem was a lack of funds. So, the community engaged in several discussions and we arrived at a certain amount of money that we were going to use to ensure the restoration of power.

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“So, we sent messages asking our people to contribute N5,000 per household to carry out the project. It took our people a long time to buy into the idea but we still achieved the desired target which was N50m. We raised the money and went back to IBEDC to let them know that we were ready to finalise the project.”

Noting that the project was ongoing, Gbadamosi said the project experienced delay because of the approval needed from the Transmission Company of Nigeria to enable IBEDC to tap power from a bay station.

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“Unfortunately, the approval from TCN that IBEDC was working on was a little bit more difficult than expected because the bay that we intended to use was controlled by Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company. It became a tug of war between IBEDC and IKEDC, and that was what further delayed the project,” he said.

ANAEDOONLINE Metro earlier reported that the spokesperson for the IBEDC, Busolami Tunwase, said the disco was awaiting the IKEDC to acknowledge TCN’s approval.

Contacted, the IKEDC spokesperson, identified simply as Kingsley, said, “I can’t speak about it. Ogijo is under IBEDC.”

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The spokesperson for the TCN, Ndidi Mbah directed our correspondent to contact the state spokesperson for the TCN, who, when contacted, failed to state her name but promised to relay the matter to the TCN’s Regional Manager and revert

She had yet to get back to do so as of the time of filing this report.

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